Day 0510 - Black Metal

Venom "Black Metal" (1982)

A bunch of Geordies having fun, playing speedy, punky metal and kind of having a bit of a laugh with it.  Yet they somehow manage to help create the genre of speed metal, and to spawn (or at least to help christen) a new, dark, twisted subgenre of metal that would go on to take itself and its church-burning far too seriously.

This album starts with the drummer cutting through a metal door with a chainsaw (according to the book... and it does sound like that's what's happening) and once the music gets going, the acoustics make it sound like it was recorded in a cave. All of this helps give the music on the album a special, feral charm.

Day 0455 - Searching for the Young Soul Rebels

Dexy's Midnight Runners "Searching for the Young Soul Rebels" (1980)

Touché 80s - the goodness continues!

Kevin Rowland and Kevin 'Al' Archer, late of the punk band 'Killjoy' formed Dexy's Midnight Runners at the tail end of the 1970s. The band's name was a reference to the 60s party drug of choice, Dexedrine.

The album opens with a confusing babble of mixed radio programme signals before these are interrupted by a raucous yell, signalling the start of the music proper. My first impression was that this would be another punky ska album (though that hadn't been my experience with the one or two DMR songs I'd heard), it turned out to be more like 'Northern soul... with guts'. Horns and backing vocals that almost have a slight hint of theatricality to their wildness.